HTC’s Vive is promising, but still isn’t selling well

The HTC Vive is, without a doubt, a very niche product. It’s a fantastic piece of tech, but it’s also $800 and needs a pretty decent PC to work. Because it launched in such a new, developing space, it’s no surprise that it isn’t blowing up sales numbers after a few months.

A new report suggests that HTC has shipped just 140,000 Vive units through August in collaboration with Valve. That’s not bad for an incredibly high-tech virtual reality product, but it’s not enough to float a company on its own.

The VR space is new, so sales are likely to go up as more content becomes available. Right now you really only see early adopters and developers getting on board, and HTC has faced the additional struggle of competing against the cheaper Oculus Rift. The Vive is more advanced product, but in the beginning that price tag makes a big difference.

The headset has only been available for six months, so these numbers are definitely going to pick up steam. The only question is how sharply they’ll increase once virtual reality is more commonplace.